


Blackout

by electriicfleur (followthefreedomtrail)



Category: Cyberpunk 2077 (Video Game)
Genre: Arguing, F/M, Hand Jobs, Johnny’s kinda soft, Porn With Plot, Shameless Smut, Spoilers, chain smoking, these idiots will like each other some day
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:34:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28130232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/followthefreedomtrail/pseuds/electriicfleur
Summary: She can’t really hurt him without hurting herself. Might as well settle into this for now.
Relationships: Johnny Silverhand/Female V
Comments: 22
Kudos: 253





	1. Boundaries

**Author's Note:**

> uh technically I’m not done with the game but I did watch some endings for it and fuuuck that shit, I’m just here to nail Johnny and fix canon

She’s so incredibly fucked.

V is a goner, this time for real. Doesn’t even matter that Johnny is the only reason she’s here to complain, because it’s _his_ fault her days are numbered and he’s so annoying. She fucking hates him.

It’s not like he’s around all the time—just that whenever he is, they’re fighting and screaming at each other.

That’s how it starts. Beginning of the end, so Vik says. He’ll pop in, doesn’t care that he isn’t welcome to the space he takes up in her mind, say something fucking stupid that provokes her. It’s a bait she always takes because she’s terminal and he’s killing her and Jackie is gone and her whole world is just different shades of death.

Sun’s setting on her life and, well—Johnny’s there and he fights back when she throws punches, even if she isn’t sure she’s not actually just fighting herself.

He’s always tossing her around, or she’s trying to strangle him, and a grisly murder scene is always just inches from reality.

Two days in, he shows up and just... sits there.

She wonders if she’d even notice him if she couldn’t feel him. Usually the tingle at the base of her skull is accompanied by his obnoxious voice but it’s like he doesn’t even know he’s there. She doesn’t know what he does when he’s not hallucinating himself into existence.

Counts sheep or some shit, maybe. Watches her nuerotransmitters release and decay.

Or, he does what he’s doing now. Sitting on the edge of her bed, chain smoking.

It’s fucking creepy. Like he’s a real person and not a figment of her disease.

Doesn’t last long. Soon as he can feel her mind on him, he grimaces and they both flinch. It’s like hearing feedback. It’s a sharp sting that has grown to be more of a nuisance than it is painful.

“Fuck off,” V tells him, but it’s half-hearted. Tired.

Usually right about now, he’d say some stupid shit. She’d say some stupid shit back. So she doesn’t really know what to do when he just looks at her like she gives him a headache. Like she is his headache.

“See you finally learned to shut up,” she mumbles, a little bit relieved but mostly just searching for a rise. She doesn’t want him too comfortable here, in her mind.

“What can I say. Had some time to think shit through.”

“And what, now we’re best fuckin’ chooms?”

“This doesn’t have to be so volatile all the time, you know.”

V rolls her eyes. “Sounds like you’re saying I should stop fighting. You’re taking over my _brain_ , asshole.”

He brings his cigarette up to his lips. “And whose fault is that? I didn’t put that chip in your head.”

She’s so sick of him. V just wants her mind back, doesn’t wanna share. Not that she’s not still mad about it because she really fucking is, but maybe he has a point. About the fighting, anyway.

She can’t really hurt him without hurting herself. Might as well settle into this for now.

It’s just that she doesn’t know what _this_ is. They can beat the shit out of each other, she knows that. Doesn’t leave any marks but it still hurts. They can talk to each other, even if it looks to outsiders like she’s talking to herself.

“Can you...” she starts, and Johnny looks up at her, “can you feel what I feel?”

“Yes. And you’re a huge downer.”

“Good. So you know just how fucking much you piss me off.”

Johnny puts out his cigarette on her floor. Not real, but it still irritates her. “Feeling’s mutual.”

“And what, can you see my memories and shit?”

“Some of ‘em.”

V digs her nails into her arms. She hopes he can feel that, too. “Which ones?”

“Does it matter?”

“ _Yes_. Some of those are personal and you can’t just root around in my fucking head.”

“Like I have a choice. They just happen to me, like mine do to you.”

“What did you see?” she demands.

“Saw your last job. What a shit show that was.”

“Are you fucking serious?” V growls, flexing her wrist. Cracking her fingers. “You don’t really wanna bring up botched Arasaka jobs.”

“Your fixer fucked you, V.”

“Yeah, _no shit_.”

It goes quiet. She can feel her own anger so powerfully, but underneath that, there’s a little of Johnny’s mixed in. She’s not positive how she can tell. It just feels... different.

V doesn’t wanna think about Arasaka or chips or Jackie anymore.

Maybe the one upside to this whole fucking mess is that she doesn’t have to explain that to him. He’ll just feel it and shut the hell up.

“Hey,” she starts.

His head turns towards her.

“What number am I thinking of?”

He stares at her, expressionless. “Seventeen.”

_Fuck._

“Lucky guess,” she mumbles under her breath.

“Mhmm.”

He pulls out another cigarette. Hasn’t even been three minutes since his last one and he—they—are already itching for it.

She watches him light it curiously. Briefly considers snatching it away.

“That even real?” she asks him.

Smoke drifts from his mouth. It _smells_ real. “No,” he grumbles. “Best I got.”

She holds her hand out, reaching for it. He takes another drag, watches her, then places the burning cigarette between her fingers.

The cigarette is tasteless. It’s been so long since she’s even had one, she can’t come up with a convincing impression of it. What’s there has got to be from Johnny’s memory but even that’s slipping.

All she knows is he wants it, _bad_. The craving is there for her too, muted but it’s still pissing her off, having an addiction she never formed.

When she gives it back, he takes it with his flesh hand. Touching him is a strange sensation. Especially when they aren’t trying to strangle each other, he feels surprisingly... warm for a construct. Life-like. Brains can manufacture insanely realistic experiences, she knows that’s all he is. An experience. A few impulses across her nervous system.

The question is just how deep that delusion goes.

She studies her hands. Studies him. He looks pretty real sometimes, when he isn’t glitching apart, but she knows better.

She reaches out to touch him. Just softly, on his face. He feels real to her but that’s how people go crazy, isn’t it? The line between flesh and blood and the engram that lives in her skull is a little too thin for her comfort, but it’s fucking fascinating all the same.

He tosses his cigarette aside, giving her a look like... hell, she doesn’t know. He’s got those sunglasses on and he always looks like someone pissed in his cereal. He doesn’t feel mad though. Not about to fight her again, at least.

She runs her fingertips across his cheek. Jaw, neck, arm, feeling the skin and muscle and bone of him, all of it indistinguishable from any body she’s ever touched.

“Un-fucking-believable,” she breathes.

He’s being so still and he’s finally quiet. Just letting her do what she wants, sating her curiosity about him and their connection. She gets an idea and he looks at her but doesn’t stop her so she climbs up onto her knees and moves to straddle him. His face follows her movement but that’s the most she gets from him.

“Wanna see something,” she tells him.

“...okay.”

She lowers one hand from his shoulder, sliding it down his chest to settle over his crotch. There’s one eyebrow visible above the rim of his glasses but he’s got nothing smart to say to her now, with her hand on the outline of his cock.

She squeezes gently. Christ, he’s easy. Already a little hard, but she can feel it herself—how _good_ he feels when she touches him.

“Huh,” V mutters.

Johnny grabs her hand and she freezes. He guides it to the top of his pants. She wants to try that, keep going and see how it all feels. Shame she has to get the bastard off to do it.

She slips her fingers beneath his waistline, starts undoing his belt and button. “Shoulda known. Even when you’re dead, you’re just trying to get off.”

“You came onto me. Remember?”

“Yeah, but that was for...” she trails off, eyes flickering shut when she pulls him out and wraps her hand around his cock. It’s not the same as being touched herself, but it’s good. Really good, and so much easier, “...for science, _holyshit_.”

“Can read you, V.”

At this point, she doesn’t care what the fuck he says. She starts to stroke him and they both suck in a breath. She can feel his pride even through the arousal and God, is he one arrogant son of a bitch.

He thinks he’s hot shit. It almost ruins the whole moment.

He wraps his fingers around hers, guiding her pumps and the pressure she applies. “Fuck, V.”

His voice sounds better like that. It’s not quite as grating when it’s all but begging and she finally feels like she’s in the driver’s seat again. V grits her teeth. His fist clenches, hers mirrors it. They’re so connected, it’s stupid and all they ever do is get under each other’s skin but this is... better. First time since she realized what was happening to her that she’s been able to tolerate him.

V pulls her hand away only to spit in it. Then she’s back on him and he can’t stop his hips from thrusting into her palm. Technically, it’s been fifty long, lonely years for him. What she feels must only be a shadow of his pleasure but it’s still really fucking hot.

She almost wants to make a _go fuck yourself_ joke.

“ _Fuck_.” He’s suddenly grabbing onto her hand and pulling it down to the base of his cock and coming, no warning. She feels that, too; the release, the warmth, the dulling throb as it fades.

V wipes her hand off on her shirt, lets herself fall back into her elbows. He’s still hanging limply out of his pants and she wonders if data has to wash itself off or if he can simply glitch his mess away.

Eventually, he lays back beside her on her bed.

A lot of the animosity between them before is just kinda... gone. Not that she doesn’t hate him. She does; she’s still dying. It’s still his fault.

She leans over his chest and plants her hands on either side of his head. They’re close enough that their chests meet on their inhales. “Fuckin’ owe me, Silverhand. For the free rent _and_ the hand job.”

“Thought that was ‘science’.”

“It—”

He glitches.

He’s gone.

She punches her mattress.

V’s alone. Dying. And Johnny fucking Silverhand is a son of a bitch.


	2. Flailing

“V! It’s you.”

V smiles a little sadly as she walks up to the 2nd Amendment. Last time she was here, she had a big, hulking shadow behind her. “Hey, Wilson.”

“I fuckin’ thought for sure you were dead. What happened? We all saw the news and—well, I guess that’s why you changed your hair and...”

This was exactly why she’d been putting this off. He starts rambling about Arasaka and NCPD sucking corpo dick. It’s what she’d expected, why she’d spent a few days holed up in her apartment.

She’s just not good at talkin’ to people. That was all Jack.

“Yeah, listen, Wilson,” she sighs, pulling out a wad of eurodollars, “I need a gun. None of that fancy shit you got. Just… somethin’ that shoots.”

He gets a wild grin on his face. “Oh, I can do that.”

He tries to sell her on a shotgun and she has to specify she needs something with more range. She’s not charging in anywhere again anytime soon and if a gonk is that close to her, she’s probably already flatlined. Wilson pulls out a couple rifles and she holds them all, peers through the scopes. She settles on one, slides him some eddies and then she’s shouldering her new weapon.

“See you around, Wilson,” she waves.

“Sure, V. Stay out of trouble. Oh, and uh—NCPD in the halls a lot these days. Careful.”

She nods. She noticed. Keeps her head down. “Thanks.”

He’s right—she passes no less than three badges on her way to the elevator, but they’re all occupied. They don’t even give her a second glance.

And yeah, maybe the new hair is to thank for not being made right then and there as Saburo Arasaka’s alleged assassin.

She’d sheared off several inches with a combat knife at Takemura’s suggestion, saying something about how easy she was to pick out with the length and brightness of it.

Now, it sits dully at her shoulders. Black and unassuming. More covert. A hell of a lot more boring, too.

Soon as she pushes the call button, Johnny appears in her peripheral.

She hasn’t seen him since the night before. He’s been mercifully quiet, almost like she had her head back to herself, but that would be a little too good to be true.

“Know what you’re doing. I don’t like it.”

If he means going back to Goro, she couldn’t possibly care any less. “I’m getting my mind back,” she says firmly.

“No, you’re not. You’re flailing.”

The elevator door opens and she steps inside. It’s better in there, with the noise of the TVs.

Because, yeah—maybe she doesn’t wanna die. Maybe that scares her more than sharing her neurons with some oldies-metal code ghost, but fuck if she’ll ever admit it. Even to the one person she can’t lie to.

“I don’t like this, V.”

“Nice thing about riding around in my consciousness? You don’t have to. So quit backseat driving.”

“Once ‘Saka’s bitch, always their bitch. Corpo pets like Takemura don’t just suddenly start batting for the other team.”

“Can’t hear you over how _shiny_ your pants are.”

That shuts him up, at least for a minute. Long enough for the elevator to reach the ground floor and her to step out into the city.

Her motorcycle is parked in the parking garage. She’s putting her helmet on when he drops in again, glasses on this time and a cigarette in hand.

“Fine, don’t listen to me.” He lights the cigarette, leans against the wall. “Don’t come cryin’ when the fire you’re playing with burns you.”

V laughs. “Ho-ho, I _won’t_. Trust me.”

She revs the bike’s engine a few times because Johnny’s still talkin’ and even though he’s in her head, it helps drown him out a little.

Not _enough_. “Shit, V, I’m just lookin’ out for you.”

Sure he is. Tries to kill her one day and he’s the angel on her should the next.

He’s looking out for _himself._

It looks like she leaves him behind when she speeds out of the garage, but V knows better.

* * *

Anders Hellman.

That’s who she’s after.

He’s her most promising lead, bound to get her closer to pulling the chip—and Johnny—out of her head than anyone else will.

He _made_ it, for fuck’s sake. If he can’t—

But she’s not gonna think about that. Because he will.

He will.

“Sure about that?”

Johnny plops down in the open booth across from her that Takemura had just left and he sounds a lot like a ticking clock.

Just a reminder that she needs to do this now. Doesn’t have time to fuck around.

V exhales loudly. “What do you want, Johnny?”

“Anyone ever tell you you’re high strung? Fuck, can hardly move my shoulders.”

“ _That’s—_ ” she shouts and then immediately quiets down when she gets strange looks, hissing only for Johnny to hear, “—because of _you,_ you fuckin’ gonk. _You_ stress me out.”

She’s not even sure he heard her. In one ear and out the other with him. He props his leg up on the table, scowls at her but he’s always doing that no matter _what_ she says. “Told you, V. I’m on your side now.”

“Right,” she scoffs, dropping her hands to the table. “Forgot. Thank god you said that ‘cause I was just about to ask if my parasite _likes_ me.”

“I can help you out. Rogue and I, we go way back.”

“I think you’ve done enough.”

“Wasn’t easy for me, either, you know. Waking up in your body. But we can help each other out.”

“You want me to cry you a river?” V leans forward, teeth bared and she doesn’t really care who sees. She does know—that this is hard for him, and maybe part of her even believes he’s given up trying to zero her. Problem is, he’s gonna be the death of her whether he means to or not. “This is not a partnership. We’re _not_ equals. This body is mine and you’re out first fuckin’ chance I get.”

She scoots herself out of the booth, grabbing her backpack and shouldering it. The bell on the door dings, she glances at the new face entering the diner, and in the split second it takes her to turn back to Johnny, he’s already gone.

* * *

The air in the Afterlife is stale and smoky. Nobody talks to her and she doesn’t want them to. She’s just there for Rogue, who it turns out, doesn’t do anything out of the goodness of her heart these days.

If V wants intel on Hellman, it’ll cost her.

Johnny’s there, watching the whole thing. Telling her what to say and how to say it. She listens to him this time.

If he’s gotta be there, she may as well use that to her advantage.

Rogue brings up T-Bug and Jackie, something about leaving _death_ in her wake, and V’s blood boils. There’s insults at the tip of her tongue ready to cut the other woman down.

That’s about when Jackie woulda stepped in for her. Beat the shit out of someone or just defused the situation. She has a feeling she’s gonna make a lot more enemies without him around.

“Easy, V. Ask her about ‘Saka tower,” Johnny says, a lot calmer than she feels, always calm in that annoying way of his, “How they shot me up right in front of her.”

V sets her jaw. Her eyes are still hard. “We all lose people sometimes, don’t we? Even you, Rogue. Arasaka tower, fifty years back. Ringin’ any bells?”

She knows she hit the right spot. Rogue’s mouth presses into a line. “You came prepared. Course.”

“How much’re we talkin’?” V has a modest amount under her mattress. It’s worth nothing if she’s dead, so she figures she can part with just about all of it.

“Fifteen.”

“Fifteen… hundred?”

“Thousand.”

V laughs. Rogue looks serious as a heart attack though and her good humor doesn’t last long. “That some kind of joke? _Fifteen grand?_ ”

“You need my help, there’s a price. Come back when you got the eddies.”

Convenient time for Johnny to shut up. “Just gonna let your output gouge me like this?” V demands angrily.

Johnny shrugs, but the way he looks at Rogue is a little disapproving. “Got no sway anymore. She’s not about to give you a Silverhand discount.”

Grudgingly, she nods, scoffing. _Jesus_. “Fine. I’ll bring you the money.”

“See you soon, V.”

She stands and leaves Rogue’s little VIP corner of the club. It’s infuriating, whole thing is _bullshit_ and she feels like kicking something. Who the _fuck_ has that many eddies to piss away?

Tip of the iceberg, that. She needs money, she needs time. And _Jackie_.

She almost hates the whole damn place just because the memories it stirs up sting. But she also feels closer to him there than she has anywhere else. Not that she’s _lookin’_ for that.

Shit—maybe she needs therapy or somethin’.

She goes to the bar, figures drinking will calm her down some. Let her think through her next steps. She orders a gin and tonic and a shot of tequila to pour out for dead chooms.

Hell, maybe Johnny will drink it. She doesn’t really care.

A man a few feet away is looking at her with interest. Her stomach flips a little when she notices. He isn’t particularly V’s type, but he makes her aware of an itch she’s been meaning to scratch.

She usually just does it herself. Might be nice, though, the company.

“Don’t make me watch that.”

Out of thin air, Johnny glitches in the barstool beside her and she drops her eyes to her drink. She forgets he can feel everything she does loud and clear, that she has no privacy anymore.

The hand not holding her drink curls into a fist. “Go. _away._ Johnny.”

“C’mon, V, that guy? Really?” He looks over his shoulder at the man in question, thoroughly unimpressed. “Looks like a cunt in a suit.”

She stares at the liquid in her cup, swirls it around. “You don’t have to be here for it.”

“You can do better than _that_ gonk.”

V laughs. There’s a sharp, incredulous edge to it. “You givin’ me pep talks now?”

“Just reminding you that you’re above this sleezebag.”

“It’s just _sex_ , Johnny, I’m not gonna fucking buy a house with him.”

The patrons around her turn to her, look at her strangely. Shit, he has her talkin’ out loud and making her look insane. Second time today.

Johnny is wearing an amused little smile. She could strangle him for how much he’s enjoying himself.

She doesn’t say anything else, finishing her drink in one final gulp. It’s to the point she’s scared to even open her mouth to breath in case she starts thinking out loud.

Probably shouldn’t be in public, _period_. Not until she figures out the mindfuck that is Johnny Silverhand.

He stops her when she moves to leave the bar, his hand against her shoulder. She knows he can touch her, sure—she’s embarrassed of _how_ she knows that but she knows.

Holding her back, though. That’s something new.

“Let me take care of you.”

V knows exactly what he means when he says that. It instantly has her on the hook, despite her best efforts, and he might’ve seen through those anyway. She turns the corner of her mouth up, the face of a woman who just gained the upper hand. “Suddenly in a giving mood.”

“Nah. Just don’t wanna watch you fake an orgasm with that corpofuck.”

“Uh-huh,” she grins, because she can feel it. What he wants. He might be stuffed in the back of her mind most of the time but certain things always bubble to the surface.

“Could just say ‘yes’. Know you’re dyin’ to find out same as me.”

V raises an eyebrow, dubious. “You serious ‘bout this?”

“Owe you one, don’t I?”

Not that she thought he’d pay up, but he definitely _does_ owe her. After last time, it doesn’t even really matter what he’s offering. She’s curious to explore just what this damn biochip is good for.

She bites her cheek, pretending to deliberate. Then, she pushes away from the bar, away from him. “ _Fine._ ”

Johnny’s smile, rare and victorious, comes out. “Knew you’d see it my way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah so. I finished the game and I’m cryin. hate that. it was so fucking glitchy every five seconds BUT the STORY was just amazingggg. as a whole, I felt it was so good.
> 
> tell me what ending you got on tumblr @electriicfleur. shoot me a message, send me an ask or whatever!
> 
> anyway, see ya next chapter for johnny giving oral.
> 
> xoxo


End file.
